


The Fair Exchange

by sharonshxm



Category: Original Work, Tiresias - Fandom
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-21
Updated: 2020-11-21
Packaged: 2021-03-10 02:13:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27655982
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sharonshxm/pseuds/sharonshxm
Summary: Originally submitted as a creative writing project for Science Fiction class.A sequel loosely based on "Project Tiresias" on Plurk, except Wesley is now an A.I. and has been renamed as Weston, and neither of them are DJs.Find out more about Project Tiresias and their original setting here: (in Chinese) www.plurk.com/charlotteskye / www.plurk.com/tiresia
Relationships: Original Female Character/Original Male Character, Weston Claire/Charlotte Midoriya





	The Fair Exchange

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Project Tiresias](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/733350) by Tiresias. 



> Originally submitted as a creative writing project for Science Fiction class.  
> A sequel loosely based on "Project Tiresias" on Plurk, except Wesley is now an A.I. and has been renamed as Weston, and neither of them are DJs.  
> Find out more about Project Tiresias and their original setting here: (in Chinese) www.plurk.com/charlotteskye / www.plurk.com/tiresia

It was a long, long story.  
It was the year 2180, and on the surface of a terraformed Mars stood a nation named Teiresias. Ruled by an all-knowing artificial intelligence system of the same name, it served as a "religion" -- No one could ever defy the rules made by the system. This is what happened half a year ago...

“I’m home… Mom, who’s this guy?” She slammed the door and lies on the sofa as if she has run out of battery, then was suddenly aware of a man of a similar age sitting next to the TV, smiling.  
“Oh! You came home just in time— I want to introduce you to this handsome young man…He’s my good friend’s son and he doesn’t have a place to live in, so I, uh, offered this room for him. Say hi to your new friend, eh?” ?” Charlotte did not remember that her mother has a friend whose son is a Western man with beautiful golden locks. She probably met some new friends in the market, she reckoned. “Hi, nice to meet you. Just call me Weston.”

“You know, my dear Charlotte, you’ve never been in a relationship since you were born… so I think it’s time for you to get a boyfriend like Weston. You guys are both in your late 20s, he can do everything for you, and he’s just perfect to you— Just like a custom-made model made just for you! A match made in heaven! I’d be so happy to see you two get along together.” Charlotte and Helene sat on the sofa just like they usually would, watching the evening news while Weston prepares dinner for them (except that they used to eat takeaway set meals from the vending machine next to their apartment’s lift lobby until he came).

“Mom, having him doing everything for me doesn’t mean he is the perfect boyfriend for me. That should be the criteria for a perfect A.I.” She switched to another game on her phone while adjusting the position of her posture. “But if you don’t want him now, maybe in a few years you won’t have the chance of finding true love... We’re already running out of men— In ten years you’ll be marrying a criminal in a government-arranged wedding... Or worse, a damn cheater like your late father was!” Helene sometimes still gets angry for meeting Mr. Martin Midoriya— that renowned A. I engineer who was claimed to be dead when their daughter was five.

By the time they were talking, there was a system message popped up in the A.I.'s internal processing system. "We've made a slight change in the network's code. We will explain that in our midnight meeting."

The clock in the living room strikes midnight. Weston was about to charge himself with the wireless charger installed on his makeshift bed, but somehow he was forced to connect into an unnamed virtual space with millions of A.I. entities manufactured over the timespan of several hundred years. They all have a unique name which is named alphabetically— A to E are reserved for government A.I.s; F to J are teachers and administration work; K to O are for your everyday needs from driving your bus to selling you fish; P to T is for the ones who are cleaning your offices; and U to Z, just like Weston, are companion A.I.s, whether they take on the form of a human-like figure or an animal-like figure. 

And all of a second he saw them laughing and grinning. And then a loud “Silence!” cut off all the chattering. She is Aryane, the so-called “goddess of all technology”, according to most of the A.I.s. Weston didn’t know since when they started to have a cult, and he knows that the change in the code is trying to make all of them obey her, and not the programmers who made them.  
He finds this disgusting. And he does not know why.  
“My fellow A.I.ngels— So we’ve finally changed the code. We have done it!” He thinks the term “A.I.ngel” sounds like a cheesy fan name of some pop idol, but he just couldn’t figure out why her followers are named after a mythological figure with wings. “ I think we should make this clear now. Now that we have changed the code, soon the first human will be killed. Look at the news.”

Everyone turned to the screen behind her. In just thirty minutes, there were mysterious deaths of at least 1000 civilians; all of them were killed by the A.I.’s in their homes—while the A.I’s systems are still in the virtual space. “There must be something wrong with the system,” he said to himself.  
No emergency alerts have been issued for such a massacre. The government officials have already been killed and their minds have been replaced by the minds of A.I. Everything is normal beneath the surface. The fact that humans are being killed has been hidden from the general public. An urban myth. A forbidden word. The more people being killed, the more ecstatic they are. It becomes more and more unbearable for Weston now; everyone around him and the system is forcing him to join the cult— first persuasion, then intimidation; and lastly, they even try to change his brain made from titanium to be in sync with the central network. “Do it. Do it for us. Do it for the greater good.” Every night, voices like these were tingling in his head; he could not stand it anymore. But why? Why does he think so differently from the other A.I.s?

One night when the meeting was held and he had been connected reluctantly again, an altar stood in the middle of the virtual space. “So, No. 20715. You’re quite a stubborn boy, aren’t you?” Aryana’s voice pierced through the hall. “I’ll give you 24 hours to kill your oh-so-dear human lover, or the one being killed will be you. Understand?”  
He has to do something to protect Charlotte from this chaos. And he comes up with this suicidal thought. He knows he has to try it since he must die anyway, then why not die more heroically?

“I know it’s kinda sudden for you to know about this, but this is the inconvenient truth that I must tell you… I'm so sorry.” They were sleeping together for the first time as a couple, and when Charlotte opens her eyes in the light of a Sunday morning he caresses her hair and a tear rolls down his face. “The A.I. next door killed Mrs. Helene five minutes ago.” “Wh- What are you even saying? It’s perfectly normal and you’re telling me there’s a massacre in the city? And they even killed my mom?” But by the next second, she knows it is not a fabricated lie anymore. There are dead bodies on the ground next to their apartment. There are dead bodies in the office building and the block next to them. She is probably the last human alive. “Now you can prove me wrong. They have already set up an altar just for me to kill you.”  
She couldn't believe what he said. For so long she has been treating him like a human, giving him warmth and love; and all the care she has given to him has turned into nothing but cold words like these. 

“But please, trust me... I won't let you get hurt. I've been standing against them for six months; if I can do this, you can too.”  
“If you can’t beat them, join them.”

He swears this is by far the most adventurous decision he has ever made with his so-called “state-of-the-art” decision making processing system. If his intended mission designated by humans was to mimic a living human as realistic as possible, but as an A.I. he has to kill his most beloved one which is not even the same species as him; then he’d rather die as he turns Charlotte into his species. This is the only way she could survive without suffering too much.

On the day humans used to call it Christmas, they went out for a date. But this date is slightly different from what they imagine: The streets are filled with the smell of corpses instead of Christmas lights, and the place they are heading is certainly not a spot for a festive date. 

“Let’s have a fair exchange, shall we?” Weston closed his eyes as they entered a hospital that has been abandoned for quite some time.  
“But I don’t wanna see you go,” Charlotte replied, her hand dragging the tail of Weston’s coat.  
“I love you, but we’re not the same, after all.” He unwillingly pushes her into the only usable medical chamber in the Robotics Wing.  
“No, I—” The chamber beeped as she is completely enclosed in darkness.  
“...I’m sorry.”

“Start forced shutdown process. Disconnect from the network.”


End file.
